Pat in Peterborough

Every year my mother has her furnace cleaned by Wayne after he installed the unit back in 2004. However, two years ago she decided to switch to Neil after he had installed an air conditioner in the house. This year when the gentleman came to clean the furnace he told us that there was something wrong. He showed me on a meter and said the heat exchanger was cracked, and the furnace was no good and had to be replaced. I said it wasn't that old and he said 13 years is about all you get. He turned the heating part of the furnace off, and we made an appointment for someone to come and see about replacing the furnace. In the meantime I called Wayne to come and give us a price as well. Anybody spending that much money would surely get 2 prices. I was hoping we might get a deal since they put it in and it was only 13 years old. Neil came and looked at the furnace and didn't really inspect it but was going to see if the part that was broken could be found and fix it. He also gave me a verbal price for a new furnace. He phoned me the next day and left me a rather nasty message on my Moms answering machine saying the part was covered under warranty but that I already knew that since I had talked with Wayne so I may as well go with them. At this point Wayne had not been out yet to even see the furnace so I knew nothing. Wayne came out later that day and checked the furnace. It turns out the part was going to be covered by warranty but he found 2 other problems. The top of the hot water tank had plastic on it and it was melted which meant it wasn't venting properly which could have been caused by the cracked heat exchanger. He also found that the vent going from the furnace to the chimney was full of ash and the liner had fallen down. He showed me a picture on his phone. This he predicted was because the furnace hadn't been cleaned properly. He also put a red tag on the furnace which was telling anybody that the furnace could not be used. At this point he was shocked that Neil hadn't done this. How could this be. Neil was supposed to have cleaned it. My mother received a call from Neil to say the bill was overdue (it was 30 days to the day) - again just a message. Upon returning the call, it's only a service that answers and not the people that I would have preferred to talk to! I called back to question the bill because the furnace had never been properly cleaned (now or in the past). I talked to his son who was going to talk to his worker and get back to me. I didn't even think the gentleman who came carried in a vacuum. He called back the following Tuesday and said his worker did vacuum and that is what he was sitting on when he found the problem. For just over 100.00 it wasn't worth the argument and grief. Since then we have had the furnace fixed to the tune of $1800.00 in part due to shoddy workmanship. Unfortunately my mother took ill and was then hospitalized so the bill got set aside. It hadn't even been 60 days when she received the letter about sending it to small claims court. I really hope they don't put my 85 year old mother in jail. She is home from hospital and is feeling better thank you.